Stobart moves to Chunnel site
Page 10
If you've noticed an error in this article please click here to report it so we can fix it.
by Juliet Morrison • Eddie Stobart Ltd is positioning itself to break into international rail transport. It has plans to operate more than 400 trucks near to the proposed Channel Tunnel freight depot in Daventry.
In the next couple of weeks the Carlisle-based operator will be moving into a 10-acre (four hectare) site, formerly used by the Malcolm Harrison truckstop, at Crick, Northants.
Initially it will re-locate 100 of it trucks from temporary sites in the Midlands, but within two years it plans to buy another 300 trucks to be based at Crick.
By this summer Stobart hopes to take on a further 10 acres of land to expand the depot and the company is negotiating for land adjacent to the depot to build 93,000m2 of warehousing. It says the moves will create at least 800 new jobs.
Stobart commercial director Barrie Thomas says the intention is threefold: to develop a major site in the Midlands; to create a "launch pad" for European expansion; and to build a closer integration between road and rail distribution.
Eddie Stobart, chairman and managing director of the business, says so far he has no customers in mind for using rail. And the Daventry terminal is not expected to open until the middle of 1996.
Stobart, which has 17 other UK depots, is the first haulage company to make a commitment to the Daventry International Rail Freight Terminal (DIRFT).